


Feeling Words

by daroos



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: 5+1 kind of, Feels, Fix-It, Get Together, Language and Translation, M/M, good thing Phil speaks Clint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-13
Updated: 2014-05-13
Packaged: 2018-01-24 15:04:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1609424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daroos/pseuds/daroos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint and Coulson have operated on a level of wordless understanding almost since they met -- which is good, because Clint is shit at verbalizing his emotions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Twiller for the language beta.

“I was getting to that.” Phil offered the dossier wordlessly. Clint took it, angry, and flipped it open. “I was going to get it,” he insisted.

“I know,” Phil said, and Clint just _knew_ that Phil had thought he was going to forget it and this was his way of gently reminding Clint that oh by the way, Clint was a shit asset and Clint would fall into the sea without his suave, experienced, not-even-getting-into-the-occasional-fistfight handler.

The feelings bubbled up inside of Clint, not for the first time, and they burst. “Then let me get the goddamned file myself,” he almost shouted. His voice rang even louder in the otherwise empty, quiet office.

Phil pulled himself back, tucking his chin in like a turtle going into its shell. He looked hurt, and he looked wary, and Clint knew it was all his fault as usual.

“Okay,” Phil replied, chin still tucked in like he might try to burrow down below the line of his tie. It was disconcerting seeing his handler... vulnerable? Emotional? Clint wasn’t even sure how to classify this, but he didn’t like it.

“You’re just— I’m always going to do things, and you’re there before I am doing them because I’m a fuckup and you’re putting out my fires before I even set them.”

“That’s—”

“It’s like, goddamn it, I know you’re better at this shit than I am but christ; let me at least fuck up before you rub my nose in it. Just stay out of my way and let me—” Clint blew out a harsh breath and put his face in my hands. “At least let me do the deed before I get the punishment.”

Phil frowned at him. Clint started to speak again but Phil held up a finger, silencing him with a shake of his head. “This isn’t punishment.” He said it gently, and that only hurt worse.

“The fuck it isn’t.”

“Clint, it’s not. It’s us working together. This is what teams do. They help each other and they anticipate their teammate’s needs.”

“That’s not—” Clint ducked his head and glared at the dossier. “Well I guess that makes me a fucking terrible teammate then; always the one that needs shit.” He stood, posture tight and angry, and moved to leave the office.

Phil stood too, easily blocking his exit. “Let me go,” Clint said.

“No,” Phil replied, frown still crinkling his brow just above his reading glasses. It was goddamned— It always, _always_ made Clint want to smooth it away with his forefinger. Instead he bundled his righteous indignation up into a knot and slammed his palm against the wall, next to Phil’s head. His hand went a little numb and his wrist ached. There was a dent in the wall and Phil didn’t even flinch.

“Let me go,” he growled.

“Not until we work this out. There’s been a—” Phil stopped. “I think this is all a misunderstanding.”

Clint could overpower him. He could probably bowl through Phil or... toss him? Phil probably wouldn’t fall for that. “There’s no misunderstanding. I knew I had some distance to go; I just thought it was like, something I could do on foot instead of like, in a rocketship or something.”

Phil frowned harder and stepped back. “What?”

Clint glanced at the door, but the shadow of disappointment that movement earned him stopped him from fleeing. “ _I can do this, Phil_.”

“I know you can do this. You’ve been doing this.” Phil took another step back, leaning his hips against his bookcase and crossing his arms. “I never thought you couldn’t do this.”

Clint moved to the doorway, mirroring Phil against the door jamb. “Then why do you keep doing things like that? I can do it. Let me do it by myself. Let me do my thing.”

“Your thing is my thing,” Phil insisted, blushing at Clint’s dirty look. “Getting you a file or bringing a new bowstring to the range or goddamn it, having breakfast ready for us when you get in— it’s not because I think you’re too stupid to get the file or you can’t take care of you own gear or because I think you can’t feed yourself. It’s because none of that is below me and I saw the chance to make things more efficient and I took it. Taking care of my assets -- letting them know I’m watching out for them -- that is my job.” Clint was feeling more and more like a turtle himself, hunching his shoulders in a protective posture. “Clint. I’m not here to judge you or mock you or punish you; I’m here to make you the best tool for SHIELD that you can possibly be. I’m here to help you be strong, and smart, and prepared. That is not something to be ashamed of, that is actually my job description.” They were silent for long minutes. Phil finally broke the silence. “Clint?”

“Yeah?”

“Tell me what’s going on in your head.”

Clint tipped his head back, and he knew, _knew_ there was a shine of tears in his eyes. “I shouldn’t be here. I’m fucking great at killing people but I’m not cut out for being an agent. You went to your fancy college and got all your society learning and your military training and I’m just scuffing up the floors with my carney dust.”

“One, you most definitely should be here. Two, yes, you are great at killing people, but you’re also becoming a well rounded asset who is invaluable to this organization. Three I went to state college, and four I can not imagine what you mean by ‘society learning’ unless you count how to eat with a fork and knife and that one should not burp in church.”

Clint glared at Phil for almost a minute before he rabbited.  
\--  
Phil knocked the back of his head against the bookcase. The moment his words escaped he knew they were wrong. He knew he’d said the wrong thing. Mocking Clint for understanding that their upbringings had been essentially different and that that fact had important, undefinable impacts on their views of the world and their interactions within it, was not the right route to take. It was neither respectful nor productive.

He had known that his asset was on edge for weeks, maybe months. He’d been able to overlook it because they worked so damned seamlessly in the field, but the extended time back at the Hub was grating on them both in more ways than just a lack of productive activity. It seemed as though every effort Phil had been making to ease the time behind desks and in meetings had just been seen as snubs, condemnations, and condescensions. He’d just made it worse and let Clint run out on him.

Phil left Clint alone through sheer force of will through the afternoon and into the evening. He got a few irate notes about Barton startling the science staff by dropping out of the ceiling, and one warning about an ominous ticking sound that was found to be Barton tapping the nock of an arrow against the metal of an air shaft in an apparently unconscious motion. It hadn’t appeared to be a deliberate act designed to terrorize, but a sector of the Analysts were evacuated until he had been located. Of course, he hadn’t been taken into custody; he’d escaped through some maintenance tunnels and was gone. The warning was that, if Security got their hands on him he might very well be in for a bit of payback.

“Barton can handle himself,” Phil wrote back. He might have tried covering for his asset this morning, but in light of their tiff, Phil thought that perhaps he should let the consequences fall and stop babying him through the system. It was what he wanted.  
\--  
“The fuck, Coulson?” They were back to last names; that wasn’t a good sign.

Phil merely raised his eyebrows in question. Clint’s hair was stuck up at angles indicating he’d been running his fingers through it, probably out of agitation. He had the barest hint of sweat at his temples, but his smell said it was probably from practicing on the range rather than anxiety.

“Don’t play like you don’t know about this shit -- you always know about this shit.”

“Well, today we will have to make an exception to that ‘always’. I’m afraid—”

“They locked my weapons. A fucking security team made me relinquish my bow and all my arrows before I left the range.”

It seemed Security had learned how to take its revenge better than Phil had anticipated. “And?”

“And you fucking left me out to dry with this shit. There’s no fucking reason—”

“You made Security’s life quite a lot more exciting than they generally like it, yesterday. You had asked me to let you deal with your own shit, so I did. I could have gone and greased some wheels to smooth things over for you, but you had just asked me -- quite specifically I might add -- to quit doing that. I was attempting to respect your wishes.”

“This is some goddamned passive aggressive—” Phil was impressed that Clint had recognized the move as just a bit passive aggressive; obviously the psych department was doing their work with troubled-student Barton.

“Clint,” Phil popped the ‘t’, derailing Barton. He tried for a tolerant, understanding look, but it probably mostly looked pained. “I want to make this work. I want to give you what you need, but right now I don’t know what that is.” They stared at each other for a long moment, like hungry animals trying to decide if the other was a steak. “Can we sit down?” Phil asked finally.

Clint glanced around the office, looking everywhere but Phil, and nodded. They sat in a parody of their normal mid morning routine; Clint sprawled in feigned ease in his guest armchair, Phil at his desk. Phil took a sip of his coffee and set it down, suddenly self-conscious. He hadn’t gotten one for Clint this morning, earning him a raised eyebrow from the canteen staff. Clint glanced at the coffee, at the breakfast sandwich sitting without a companion, and away.

“Did you eat breakfast?” Phil asked patiently. Clint looked guilty and didn’t reply, which was answer enough. Phil unwrapped the sandwich -- egg and cheese on a poppy seed bagel -- and put half of it in front of Clint. He picked up the other half and took a deliberate bite.

“I don’t need your food.”

“No, you don’t. But I don’t like eating alone, and I don’t like my assets skipping meals if it can be helped. This isn’t just about you.” Clint glared at the sandwich and pointedly didn’t reach for it. “You realize it’s not even my food, right? SHIELD cafeterias don’t charge anybody anything for eating there; it’s one of the perks of the job.”

“That’s not the point.”

“What is the point, then?” Phil asked, patient, and feeling a little less grumpy now that he was getting his breakfast into himself.

“I can take care of myself,” Clint stated.

Phil bit back the automatic retort of, _well obviously you can’t_ , because that was patently untrue. Clint had survived situations as a child which Phil knew he himself would have been hard pressed to overcome as an adult. Clint had persevered through a truly intense adolescence fueled, from what Phil could tell, largely by caramel corn, orneriness, and a simple unwillingness to lay down and take it. Surviving was a very different animal from living. Not dying, and taking care of yourself were not the same thing, and Phil had yet to instill that in his asset. Some of his thoughts must have leaked through to his expression because Clint glowered harder. “I can; I’m not your dog that needs treats and a water bowl.”

Phil finished his half of the sandwich in two big bites. He glanced at Clint’s half of the sandwich. Clint’s hand shot out faster than his eye could follow and snatched the sandwich, bringing it close to his chest. Clint shot a querulous look at Phil and made a conscious effort to relax.

“I know you are strong and capable and smarter than you’d ever want anybody to know,” Phil began. “But sometimes we all need a little help, and sometimes some of us like to help out even when it’s not really needed, because it makes us feel good, and it keeps everything running smoothly.”

Barton began on his sandwich half with an mmpf of satisfaction.

“I know you wouldn’t starve if I didn’t bring breakfast, but...” Phil trailed off, wondering how close to the truth he could skirt without dropping the _I totally love carney felons with great aim and smart mouths please come home with me_. “I grew up in a family that showed it cared for people by feeding them.” Clint’s eyes skittered over what Phil knew was his overly earnest expression. “Are you going to make me spell it out for you, Barton?”

Clint reddened slightly. “No sir,” he mumbled into his sandwich.

“At times you have been a pain in my ass, but you have never been a burden. Is that clear?” Phil got a full-mouthed ‘yes sir.’

They both tried to fidget through some paperwork -- Phil a review of action reports, Clint a series of computer-based OSHA workshops which, given SHIELD’s usual tactics, were at times unintentionally funny -- but gave up rather quickly. “Lets go to the mess. Someone ate half my breakfast.” Phil stood, shooting his shirt cuffs. Barton gave him a leery look but seemed to realize the comment was meant fondly rather than as reproof.

Phil procured fresh coffee and another sandwich from an obviously curious kitchen staff. Barton filled a mug with a mix of four different artificial machine-frothed mocha-like beverages and plonked down a boat of tater tots, seating himself opposite to Phil. Phil frowned. “I thought you took your coffee black,” he said, eyes flicking between the frothy, toffee-smelling beverage and Clint’s face.

“That was just— you always—”

“You didn’t want to be a bother,” Phil surmised.

Clint flushed, equal parts angry at being found out and embarrassed. “I just felt special when you brought me food; I didn’t want to seem ungrateful.”

Phil sighed. They still had a long road to travel.


	2. Chapter 2

Clint shifted again, rousing them both. He and Phil were in a safe house attempting to get some rest prior to exfil in about four hours. The single twin bed was not working for two grown men, but there was honestly not another place in the room for either of them to try and sleep. Clint would have called the space a closet if he hadn’t been familiar with Japanese temporary housing construction prior to encountering the SHIELD safe house.

Phil murmured soothingly, not entirely awake, and pressed himself against the wall harder in an attempt to give Clint more room on the small mattress. Clint had tried sleeping on both back and stomach. He had pulled his right shoulder tumbling out of his nest in the hurry to escape detection after taking his shot, and if he lay on his left he would be big-spooning Phil -- a position he didn’t trust his dick to not take the wrong way. Phil slept on his sides exclusively, with the creepy ability to sleep sitting upright with his eyes barely slitted open.

“What’s the problem, Barton?” Phil murmured as he reached a level of consciousness where sentences were possible.

“Just my shoulder bothering me.”

“Pain meds?” Phil asked on a yawn.

“Maxed out on ibuprofen. I just can’t seem to get comfortable.”

Phil huffed a breath out through his nose and sat up. He pushed Clint against the wall into the dip his body had made, stuffed the pillow under Clint’s injured arm, and took the big spoon position for himself, laying his arm so it would act as pillow for both of them. Clint froze at the intimacy of the position. Phil harrumphed again and tucked his other arm against the pillow to help hold Clint’s shoulder at a comfortable angle, coincidentally laying his forearm across Clint’s chest and snugging Clint close to his chest in the embrace.

Clint remained tense until the cramp in his shoulder grew too painful. Phil buried his nose in Clint’s back and snuggled closer in sleep and Clint let out a breath. It was strange to Clint how well they fit together. Phil’s arm under his head was well muscled, with a thin layer of fat which Clint could never seem to cultivate no matter how much he ate. He and Phil were of average height, which made them seem downright small in SHIELD’s company of giants. Because of that their legs fit together, Phil’s chest lay neatly along his back, and their hips... Clint schooled his dick to keep its opinions to itself and go to sleep.

In spite of libidinous thoughts Clint drifted off to sleep for the remaining few hours he had. He woke to the sensation of being pleasantly squeezed and startled. Phil groaned in displeasure at the beeping alarm of his watch.

“Wheels up in five,” Phil murmured quite close to his ear and sat up. Clint nearly rolled after the arms that had held him all night in a futile attempt to recapture the feeling of being safely ensconced in bed with someone he trusted, but barely held himself back.


	3. Chapter 3

“Myaaaaaaaaaahhhhuggghhhhhh,” Clint groaned, an expression of anguish, ennui, and frustration.

“No.”

“Euuuuuuuhhhhuuuu,” he whined, high-pitched and pleading.

“No.”

Clint made a sound not unlike a pleading dog, his puppydog eyes in full effect. 

“Clint, I know. Being injured is awful. You will just have to rest; I will under no circumstance aid you in escaping medical to go lick your wounds, _potentially literally knowing you_ in that fifth-floor walkup deathtrap you call an apartment.”

Clint collapsed against his pillows with a wince of actual pain, the tension of actual panic beginning to crawl like a living thing over Clint’s skin. “I don’t wanna stay here.”

Phil looked down helplessly at his asset. It was their first real injury as a team and Phil could see it pulling all of Clint’s insecurities, fears, and triggers up all in one go. His leg was broken, making it impossible for him to run if he’d needed to. He’d taken most of the skin off of the back of his right hand, making it painful if not impossible to shoot. And his collarbone; there would be a knot of knit bone close to the rise of his shoulder for the rest of his life. All in all, it wasn’t a gunshot wound, but it wasn’t a good day. And Clint, in spite of all the coping mechanisms he had learned, all the assumed self-confidence and assassin calm, had reverted emotionally to something close to the scared kid he had been when they first met.

It pained Phil to see him like that. It hurt under his breastbone seeing the other man so raw, skirting the edge of control, over something as outwardly simple as being bed bound.

Phil sighed and sat in the visitor chair. He reached out his hand to take Clint’s uninjured one. Clint gripped it like a lifeline, tighter than the contact should warrant. “Talk to me, then -- what would help?”

Clint’s face bunched up in actual distress, years of not showing weakness warring with the obvious discomfort which his situation caused. Phil stroked the back of his hand in a repetitive motion. “I don’t want to stay here,” he admitted with a whine of almost panic. “Please, Phil, get me out of here. Make me stay in your office, whatever, just— I can’t breathe in here.”

Phil glanced around medical and searched his mind for some solution. He closed his eyes in a brief prayer that he wasn’t doing the stupidest thing yet that week. “Okay. Be ready to move in ten.” The relief that immediately loosened Clint’s muscles made Phil feel guilty for having debated whether he should help.  
\--  
“Nooooooo,” Clint moaned. Or whined. The doctor had given him a last dose of strong pain meds before sending them out the door. “I can’t, Phil: this is where you live.” Clint mashed his face against the car window and stared morosely at the rest of the cars in the underground parking lot.

“Yes, and until you can open a jar without help, it is also where you are going to live.” Clint made another unhappy sound. “Unless you’d like to go back to medical.”

“I don’t want to put you out.”

“Clint, listen to me.” Phil waited until he was sure he had what there was of Clint’s attention. “I wouldn’t have arranged this if it wasn’t okay with me. So quit worrying about it, and lets get you settled.”

“Yeah, okay,” he agreed, the fight suddenly gone from him.

They rode the elevator up quietly. Clint stole what he probably thought were covert looks at Phil until he snapped, “What?”

“I just realized I’m gonna see where you live,” Clint replied. “Isn’t that like, level six top-secret?”

Phil’s expression softened a fraction. “Not as such.”

He helped Clint into his apartment and tamped down the little bursts of excitement and anxiety that thought elicited.

“Oh wow. I see now why you think my place is a shithole.”

“I didn’t—” Phil protested.

Clint moved on automatic and his air cast, and plastered his face against the windows which took up most of his exterior wall. Phil made a pained sound and moved Clint to the couch. “Do you sleep here?” Clint asked.

“Yes, Clint, it’s my apartment.”

“No, but here.” Clint looked meaningfully at the bed.

When Phil had moved, the studio apartment had been all he could justify renting. Now, six years on, he’d simply become entrenched in an apartment whose charm was, if not undeniable, at least possible to understand. Windows overlooking a small park marched across one wall and a variety of Captain America memorabilia covered the opposite wall. The couch rested against the foot of a full-sized bed and both faced a bookshelf which divided the space into cooking/eating and relaxing/sleeping.

“Yes, that is my bed. You’re going to be using it for the foreseeable future, though.” Phil held up his hand to forestall an argument. “That was the deal -- you get lots of good rest, the doctors let you leave medical.”

Clint nodded like that was finally something that made sense.


	4. Chapter 4

Clint growled in frustration -- actually growled. Phil tried not to let his dick voice any opinions about how much it enjoyed that sound. “Problem?” he asked instead.

“Just this fucking—” Clint growled again and muttered something that sounded like, “janky-ass.”

“Talk to me Barton.”

Clint came out of the bathroom looking disheveled and disgruntled, his tie wrinkled and knotted. Phil closed his eyes and dropped his head. He raised one hand and beckoned Clint over. With gentle fingers he disentangled the tie from around Clint’s neck, unknotted it, and lay it on the ironing board. He teased it flat once more and let it cool while he buttoned and popped Clint’s collar.

He’d pushed for his asset to get a spot amongst the guests instead of hiding in the rafters or planted within the serving staff. The op itself was more protection detail than assassination, and thus having the asset close to the target was likely key. As much as Clint had protested he saw better from afar, Phil had seen this mission as crucial training if his assassin was going to move beyond being just an assassin. He hadn’t quite considered the less esoteric challenges the op might pose for both of them.

“Preference on knot?” he asked.

“I don’t even know what that means,” Clint admitted mulishly.

“Half Windsor it is.” Phil sized up the ends of the tie, attempting to ignore the smooth lines of his asset’s freshly shaven throat. After two failed attempts to get the knot properly, his attention was genuinely diverted. “This is easier on myself,” he grumbled.

“Here, why don’t I—” Clint batted his hands away and turned so his back fitted along Phil’s front.

“Um...” Phil hedged, but mushed up against his asset’s (finely formed) back side, reached under his arms and in an awkward hug position, did up the tie with effortless familiarity. He cinched it tight, even managing to put a jaunty little dimple into the tongue of the knot. He flipped down Clint’s collar and checked the tie one last time. “You’re set.”

Clint turned, the hint of a shamed blush still coloring his cheeks. “Thanks. I’m not so good at...” He gestured at himself.

Phil forced himself to glance away. “I don’t know -- you seem to be doing just fine aside from the tie.”


	5. Chapter 5

Clint felt the helpless rage boil -- the emotional imperative to _hurt_ the another so they understood how he was hurting, or at the very least, feared ever hurting Clint again -- like hot tar somewhere between his stomach and his heart. Clint was an expert at letting things roll off his back from casual insults to the occasional blow from someone hyped up or stupid enough to want to pick a fight with him. This, though, this: it hit close to home, and nearly dead center in the stomach of a scared little kid, discounted by adults and lost in the system. The feeling of invalidation burned bright, the sharp hurt of disregard stinging like a slap to the face, and the pure, helpless knowledge that the persecutor had grown in soil free from the taint of Clint’s own upbringing, and thus could not be brought low so simply or efficiently.

He snarled, a noise of animal rage -- the sound of a beast in a trap snapping to get out -- and launched bodily at the other agent. The agent wore a smirk of sick pleasure and bemused condescension and time seemed to slow as Clint chose and discarded injuries to inflict. At the half-way point Clint had decided he would rip the other man’s ears off. That would mark him well enough, and probably hurt, and take him off of field duty as well.

And Phil was there. He caught Clint in the middle with his own body in a tackle that redirected Clint’s attack into a roll, causing him to completely miss his target. Clint snarled again. Phil’s suit was in disarray from the tumble, his hair flying up a bit, and the print of the walkway grating pressed red into the side of his face. Phil placed himself between the two men facing the Agent, hand splayed behind himself in a holding gesture at Clint. “Agent Marshall you will report to Hill—” Phil oofed as Clint clipped him, attempting to rush Marshall, and interrupted his order to get an arm around his asset and execute a neat throw and pin. “MOVE,” Phil ordered as he rode Clint like a squirrely bronco in an attempt to prevent further escalation of the altercation.

Marshall moved.

Clint strained and made another animal sound of anger. Phil sat astride him calmly, torquing his arms so he could neither escape nor harm either of them, but not making any other move to try to calm his asset. Clint abruptly went limp under him, his forehead pressed into the floor grating.

“If I let you up are you going to stay here?” Phil asked.

“I’ll tear that fucker’s ears off,” Clint growled.

Phil nodded though Clint couldn’t see it, as though he’d expected that answer and was nonplussed by it. “Fair enough. Want to talk about it?”

Clint roared, and it echoed down the halls and tensed his chest like bellows. The outlet seemed to calm him, or at least drain him. Phil judged that Marshall had made it through at least two security doors by then, and relaxed his hold.

“I’m going to have to put something on this report,” Phil noted.

Clint got his arms under him and torqued his hips to get Phil off. Phil stood and backed up a step. Clint stayed on the ground and scooted until his back was against a solid wall. He pulled his knees against his chest and buried his face in his forearms. Phil gave him space and time. Clint made more angry, anguished noises, muffled by his own flesh. If one were unfamiliar with the man, one might conflate his verbalizations with those of a toddler having a tantrum. As it was, Phil was familiar enough with Clint to recognize them as symptoms of a man wrestling with pain.

Phil sat next to him, arms not quite touching, and leaned his head back with a sigh. He glanced up at the sound of a level four security detail. He made eye contact with the leader and shook his head in a silent stand-down. Clint looked up long enough to glower at security but went back to his stewing momentarily.

“This isn’t like you Clint,” Phil said gently. “I’m just worried.”

Clint scooted just close enough to lean his head against Phil’s shoulder. He was trembling. Phil slung an arm around him and squeezed. It was true -- Clint was prone to verbal outbursts, and excellent at antagonizing everyone within range with well-aimed barbs and snipes. Physical violence was something he saved for work. The utterly unprofessional bent of the attack indicated there was something else at work in his mind. In those early days when he’d been brought in, straight out of poverty and street-life and near street-death, he had been prone to picking fights and scrapping, earning himself a perpetually crooked nose and a bruised pride. He’d long ago learned that information was the preferable weapon, and he made sure to be well armed against most who wanted to pick a fight with Hawkeye.

“He was saying how the girl who that little squirrely director guy molested was probably asking for it. Throwing it around, or something, or they were just making it up for publicity.”

Phil frowned and tried to parse that statement into something meaningful. “Woody Allen?” Phil asked finally.

Clint glowered and muttered, “Asshole,” but Coulson suspected it was directed at Woody Allen, not anybody actually present.

“You got in an... altercation... over Woody Allen?”

Clint nodded dourly and added, “Over how he’s a creep-ass child molester and no matter how good Marshall thought _Midnight in Paris_ was he was still a fucking pervo freak.”

“Oh.”

“And then Marshall said you never know with those cases and who really knew who was telling the truth.” His voice went high and mocking when quoting the other agent.

Clint stopped. Phil squeezed just a bit. “And that’s what I walked in on?”

Clint nodded into his shoulder.

They sat silently until Clint had stopped shaking and his breathing rose in a regular swell under Phil’s arm. “Now, don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m guessing this was more than just an academic argument for you?”

Clint sat up and ran his hands through his hair. His eyes were a bit red, and he swiped his wrist across his nose. “Yeah, well, we didn’t run away to join the circus just because Bartons are congenitally stupid,” Clint replied with a snap.

Phil hummed in agreement. “I can understand how that would be distressing,” he acknowledged.

Clint shook his head. “Just, how he was saying maybe she asked for it; no fucking child asks for it.” His voice rose and he balled up his fists and roared again, a sound of impotent anguish and rage. A vein in his forehead stood out at the effort.

“I’ll be sure that’s all put down in the report,” Phil said.

“It just wound me— he wasn’t even really trying to piss me off until he knew he hit a nerve. Then it was all bets off. Nobody ever believes the kid, and this jackass is going around saying—” He bit off the end of his sentence. “It just brought up some stuff, I guess. How dare he—”

Phil sighed, and rubbed his hand on Clint’s back as he unburdened a string of outrage, self-righteous anger, hurt, and frustration. He didn’t particularly track the words; just murmured sounds of agreement and rubbed Clint’s shoulder at appropriate times. Eventually he ran out of steam and grew quiet.

“We’ll make this right, Clint. Okay?”

Clint nodded.

“And we should get you to medical; those scrapes will need some antibac.”


	6. Chapter 6

Clint found him just two days after he’d been sent home. A nurse was on call, and visited at regular four-hour intervals, but otherwise Phil was both secret and left alone. He would have been bored, if he hadn’t been rather high on pain medicine and entertaining himself by catching up on TIVO’ed reality television.

Clint entered his apartment with a key long-ago supplied to the “In case the worst happens” folder that Phil and every SHIELD agent was required to keep up to date. He had several folded up boxes, an unsure gait, and a dead look in his eyes. He did a double take at the television, and didn’t even glance at Phil before turning it off, dropping the boxes, and going to sit at the breakfast bar. He propped his face in his hands and groaned, long and low. He had a patch of the hair by his neckline shaved off and gauze taped over a wound probably caused by a shower of debris. He trembled slightly.

“Clint?” Phil asked softly.

Clint flinched, but didn’t react otherwise. Phil moved his feet across the couch and onto the floor and tried to stand. His hiss of pain when he tried to stand finally drew Clint’s eyes, his brow furrowed.

“What are you doing here? How did you-” Phil stopped himself from finishing that very stupid sentence. Clint had obviously come to clear out his apartment, per his final request.

Clint continued to stare at him with an expression between mild confusion and annoyance.

“Clint?” Phil tried again.

“Tash said you were dead. I mean, Fury said you were dead, but he lies like a lying fuck.” He looked down at his hands an expression of understanding coming over him. “Is this me finally cracking?” he asked himself.

“No, Clint, I’m alive. I died a few times on the table, apparently, but I’m fine now.”

Clint gave him a sarcastic look. “Yeah, because that’s a lot more likely than me having a psychotic break. Finally.”

“Clint.” Something in Phil’s voice caused Clint to go blank-faced and tense. “Come over here please.”

Clint stood and approached the couch as though Phil might disappear if he came on too directly. Phil held out his right hand, drugs blunting his feelings to bittersweet longing and splashes of happiness at seeing Clint physically and, as far as he could tell, psychically whole. Clint made a little whine in the back of his throat and took the hand with both of his own, sitting beside Phil.

“I wasn’t sure I wanted to be alive in a world where you’d been brainwashed and killed,” Phil said.

“I’d always told myself, ‘Next near death experience, Barton, you’re gonna get the hell over yourself and spill your guts like a highschool girl’. Then you went and died on me.”

“Spill your guts?” Phil asked.

Clint frowned and chewed his lip. “I’ve been in love with you for a while now.” He squeezed Phil’s hand as though reassuring himself the other man was still there.

“Really? Why?” Phil asked bewildered. “I mean, me too,” he added hastily.

Clint’s head dropped, his eyes downcast, and his shoulders slumped. He ran his fingertips along Phil’s palm in an unconscious sort of gesture that tickled just a bit. He looked up through his eyelashes. “You’ve seen me at my worst and you stuck around. It came on kinda quiet and I just-- I think we’re kinda past any grand declarations.”

Phil didn’t want to admit that what he felt was relief, but he felt a weight off his chest nonetheless. “Love isn’t about the grand gestures,” he said. He nodded towards the bed. Clint’s expression of hope was heartbreaking and a revelation. He stood with Clint’s help, and they shuffled over to his bed. It took some working to figure a way that Phil’s still healing wound wasn’t pulled, and Clint didn’t put pressure on the truly impressive number of lacerations on his back and shoulders, but they were snuggled together by the end of it.

“Phil?” Clint asked hesitantly.

“Yes?”

“Never go and die on me again.”

Phil was silent for a long moment. “If you promise not to take on any more gods.”

“Strictly sociopaths, megalomaniacs, drugs lords, and decidedly bad humans,” Clint agreed.

Phil gave into a long-buried desire and kissed Clint’s hair, nuzzling his nose into the soft strands.

“Phil?”

“Hmm?” Phil was dozing off, sleep cradling him like a soft blanket for once since his recovery.

“Maybe when we’re not both fucked up we could get up to some kinky shit.”

Phil hummed in agreement. “I’ve always had a thing for your ass,” he agreed.

“Not the arms?” Clint asked, flexing a bit for emphasis and sounding almost offended.

Phil smiled, slow and lazy. “Everyone gets to appreciate those. I like to think I notice your more... hidden assets.”

Clint groaned. “Do you make puns during sex? Because if so we might have a problem.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Questions, comments, concerns, concrit, and any errors are always appreciated.


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